I happened to be watching television with a young relative of mine and I caught a glimpse of the CGI Mrs Tiggy-winkle (top left in the picture), who features in a modern Peter Rabbit series on children's TV channels. I was astonished to see that Mrs Tiggy-winkle has begun to look suspiciously like the paler faced African Pygmy Hedgehog (bottom left of the picture), rather than our native Western European Hedgehog (bottom right). Whilst writing in the Lake District, I'm pretty sure Beatrix Potter did not see a pet hedgehog amble by. I'm disappointed that thousands of children will see such misleading representation of our native wildlife and a Mrs Tiggy-winkle that is not true to the original illustrations.

For more information on this common mix-up see my earlier post about pet African pygmy hedgehogs and our native European hedgehogs.

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it should be illegal to own a female hedgehog and not name it Mrs Tiggywinkle